Notre-Dame: Hunt for ‘dad and daughter’ in photo goes viral

A plea to find two people pictured outside Notre-Dame cathedral minutes before the devastating fire erupted has gone viral on social media.

A heart-warming photo shows what appears to be a father and daughter playing happily outside the historic landmark in Paris.

Tourist Brooke Windsor, 23, says she took the picture about an hour before the blaze ripped through the building.

In a bid to find them, she posted the photo on Twitter.

"Twitter if you have any magic, help him find this," she wrote.

As it stands, the tweet has been shared 66,000 times by people across the world determined to help Ms Windsor track down the pair.

Ms Windsor, from Michigan, US, told the BBC she had yet to identify the man and girl in the photo but was hopeful of doing so.

She admitted that she was unsure whether they were father and daughter, saying it was "simply the dynamic I observed from them while debating on interrupting this moment".

She called on Twitter users to "step up" and help her find them.

"If it were me, I'd want the memory. Hoping he feels the same way," Ms Windsor, who is visiting the French capital with a friend, said.

The flames quickly reached the roof of the cathedral, destroying the wooden interior before toppling the spire.

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Ms Windsor said she stood among thousands of people in streets around the cathedral solemnly watching the fire in horror.

"We watched in shock and heartbreak with the rest of Paris," she told the BBC.

As France comes to terms with the disaster, her poignant photo was described as "historic" and a "special moment in time" by Twitter users.

"This is going to become THAT photo," Michelle Bhasin commented.

"So sad to see the building looking serene and safe in the sun. Just before this dreadful disaster," Theodora Wayte wrote.

"That's a keeper! Amazing photo. Could be historic too," Scott Greene posted.